Our Ethics

Ethics
During his training at Maison Lenôtre, Marc received some advice from Gaston Lenôtre himself: 'Rigour, Rigour, Rigour... in everything you do'.

And that is Marc's guiding principle which he applies to all areas of the business from sourcing the finest cocoa and best ingredients, through to the selection of suppliers, partners, clients and employees, and of course the production of his chocolates.

We continuously strive for the highest quality and strongly believe that you can't have the highest quality without humanity. Our formula is very simple: TLC - Quality in Taste, Quality in Life for producers (that's the humanity part) and quality in Cultivation.

We recognise that this is a continuous process and as such we are constantly challenging and working in partnership with our suppliers and taking action when needed. For example we have never sourced any cocoa from the Ivory Coast due to well documented child labour issues and in 2009 completely stopped buying any cocoa and cocoa derivatives which could be traced back to Ghana. To avoid any ambiguity we have decided to blend our own chocolate from single estate plantation to country origin level.

It is our utmost priority to ensure that none of our products have been handled unfairly, forcefully or illegally throughout the supply chain and are particularly committed to help eradicate child labour in the production of cocoa. As such we are supporting a worthy project in Vietnam and will be continuously highlighting the issues through public awareness campaigns and further project work. On a wider scale, we have also been strong supporters of the NSPCC and the Princess Margarita Trust - two important charities focused on the welfare of children - for a number of years.

Although chocolate is traded as a commodity, we don't treat it that way. Chocolate is our passion and it is our mission to bring you some of the best and most interesting chocolate from around the world provided it 100% conforms with our strict TLC formula.

We go to great lengths to get to know, continuously question and work in close partnership with our suppliers. We seek as much information about each supplier as we possibly can and invest time and resources to build long-lasting sustainable relationships. This is hard work but by working closely with our suppliers, we are able to immediately address any issues that arise and ensure the best quality at all times.

We endeavour to continuously address and highlight important issues. We do not see ourselves as just a business aiming to sell chocolate - we are a conscientious and ethical company, passionate about chocolate, who strongly believe that humanity is the essence of quality and quality is our obsession.

Some facts

Our cocoa butter is from Ecuador, Philipines and the Dominican Republic

The sugar we use for our Caramel Chocolates is British Beet sugar

We do not add palm oil or any other substitutes to our chocolate

Our delicious cream is supplied to us from Hampshire and a Jersey Herd Farm in Cornwall

Where possible we source our ingredients from British small holders or pick and grow them ourselves

We do not add additional sugar to our chocolates but sweeten with our own special blend of traceable honey - a natural inverted sugar

We do not add any synthetic or artificial flavourings to our chocolates

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